I got to the event a good half hour early. As I crossed the small parking lot outside the Oak Lawn Grange I was intercepted and asked about my business.
“I’m just here to take notes and a few pictures,” I said, “for RI Future.”
Pause. “We’re not set up yet,” said the man, “you’ll have to wait.”
“Okay,” I said, “I’ll sit over at the picnic tables.”
“Sure,” said the man, “Why not? It’s a beautiful day out.”
It was. I sat for a few minutes, reading my phone, when another man holding a clipboard approached me. We introduced ourselves. He was Leo Skenyon, Nicholas Mattiello’s chief of staff.
“I don’t know if we can get you in,” said Skenyon, “We’ve got over 130 people coming, and priority will be given to Cranston residents.”
“Okay, “ I said, “I get that. I can stand. I just need to take some notes and a few pictures.”
“We might get you into the basement with a TV,” said Skenyon, “You’ll be able to hear the answers, but you might not hear the questions.”
“We’ll see what happens then,” I said.
I waited outside near the entrance, watching people arrive. I saw two people from the Rhode Island Coalition Against Gun Violence (RICAGV) handing flyers to passers by. One of them was Tom Wojick.
“Do you support common sense gun legislation?” asked Tom, holding out a flyer to a man and his wife.
“No,” said the man, “I’m a NRA member.”
I had taken a bus on a Saturday morning to the middle of Cranston to see Representative Nicholas Mattiello, the Speaker of the House and arguably the most powerful politician in Rhode Island, engage with his constituents.
This isn’t an every day occurrence. Some reps have regular events with their constituents, some have none, but as Mattiello told the crowd, his duties as Speaker take up a lot of time, and he doesn’t often get the chance to hold events like this. Today was a rare chance to see Mattiello engage with his constituents and hear what voters in Mattiello’s district care the most about. [Spoiler: It’s RhodeWorks]
Mattiello wasn’t alone either on stage or behind the scenes. Organizing the event were about a dozen men delivering coffee and donuts, escorting people to their seats and acting as what seemed like de facto security. There were two Cranston police officers stationed at the event. In addition to Leo Skenyon, who was organizing, I saw Larry Berman, communications director for the RI House of Reps, helping out.
On “stage” with Mattiello were RI State Senators Frank Lombardi and Hanna Gallo, Rep Robert Jacquard and RI Department of Transportation director Peter Alviti, there to answer technical questions about truck tolls and RhodeWorks.
When I entered the Grange Larry Berman saw me and said, “He can come in,” but behind me Leo Skenyon said, “He’s taking a couple of pictures and heading downstairs.”
That’s what I did. Here’s one:
Downstairs in front of the TV was a man who was interested in RhodeWorks but happened to live in Providence, so he was sent to the basement with me. A minute later we were joined by Lorraine Savard, wearing a small version of her “Save Burrillvile: No New Power Plant” sign pinned to her lapel.
At least I was in good company.
We ended up watching everything on closed circuit TV, downstairs from the main event. We laughed when the camera upstairs went to a wide shot, showing at least seven empty seats in the main room. We laughed again when we noticed that the two police officers were in the downstairs room with us, leaving no police presence in the room above, where over one hundred people were in attendance.
Most of Mattiello’s talk was a defense of RhodeWorks. One idea the Speaker was keen to dispel was that RhodeWorks was broadly unpopular. He said that he has in his district 14 thousand constituents and 10 thousand registered voters. When he counted the number of emails he received opposed to RhodeWorks, it was thirty.
“I don’t believe that,” said the man from Providence sitting next to me.
But I don’t think Mattiello lied. People in Mattiello’s district aren’t that upset about RhodeWorks, or at least not upset enough to threaten him politically. Mattiello maintains that the reason people don’t like RhodeWorks is because they are misinformed about it.
“We have a talk radio community,” said Mattiello, “misinformation gets out through that medium” either through callers saying things that aren’t true or talk show hosts repeating false information.
“Misinformation takes your vote away from you,” said the Speaker.
Lombardi and Jacquard also defended their RhodeWorks votes. Lombardi said, “We live in a post 38 Studios world. RhodeWorks opposition is based on a distrust of [any] legislation, not on the plan itself.”
Gallo went a different direction, touting the work she does on education, including full day kindergarten.
Eventually the question and answer phase of the discussion, nearly three hours into the event, got around to a subject other than RhodeWorks. A woman (it was very hard to hear the specifics of her question on the TV) asked about the three bills the RICAGV has brought forward, including the bill to prohibit people with concealed carry permits from bringing guns into schools.
“There are two sides to this issue,” said Mattiello (who incidently has an A+ rating from the NRA), “There are those who want no change [to our guns laws] and there are those who want to abolish guns.”
This opening surprised me. The RICAGV has worked hard to strike a nuanced position on guns, and here Mattiello was claiming that the group was simply seeking to abolish all guns.
As for guns in schools, said the Speaker, “Please tell me where this has been a problem. And if its never been a problem, you’re affecting the rights of law abiding citizens.”
Mattiello gave the hypothetical situation oaf a man with a concealed carry permit picking his kid up at school. Is he supposed “to leave his gun on the sidewalk? Leave it in his car where it might be stolen, or drive home and drop it off first?”
“In trying to solve a problem you’re creating a bigger problem,” said the Speaker.
Guns are not allowed in courthouses or airports, countered the woman (and I might add, not allowed in the State House where Mattiello works either.)
Senator Lombardi cut in at this point, saying that the problem isn’t gun owners, it’s the mentally ill accessing guns. Columbine and Sandy Hook were the results of mental illness, said Lombardi, not lack of gun control.
“If,” said Lombardi, “God forbid, a [gunman] goes into a Cranston school, I hope the first person he sees is a law abiding citizen with a concealed carry permit.”
“We have to address the mental health aspect of this equation,” added Mattiello, “People with concealed carry permits are not the problem. I don’t think they’ve ever been the problem.”
Mattiello’s last words on the issue of guns were, “You can affect the behavior of people who respect the law, but not the behavior of those who don’t respect the law.”
That kind of makes me wonder why we pass any laws.
The next question was about the ethics commission.
“Senator Sheehan’s bill is the worst bill I’ve ever seen,” said Mattiello, “I can’t imagine supporting that bill because it make’s no sense to me.”
“Conflict of interest rules are ‘gotcha’ politics,” said the Speaker, “lawyers in the General Assembly serve clients across the country. Technically they are always in conflict of interest. They would never vote!”
Mattiello feels that Sheehan’s bill will encourage “frivolous complaints”. “What’s going to happen is good people are not going to want to run [for office],” said the Speaker.
“Most people in government are extremely ethical,” continued Mattiello, “Everybody up there, I believe, is entirely ethical and good.”
Mattiello seems to believe that the job of identifying conflicts of interest falls to the fourth estate, saying, “Kathy Gregg is a great reporter. She points out every conflict of interest.”
Somewhat echoing his last word on gun control laws, Mattiello said about ethics, “Ethics commissions don’t make better people. That’s [the electorate]’s job.”
Other random things of interest Mattiello said during the meeting:
“I disagree that the Speaker is the most powerful person in the state. Sometimes it’s the governor.”
Ex-Speaker Gordon Fox, now in prison, “had his problems but he did good things policy wise.”
“I don’t believe in trickle-down economics. I just want to be competitive with our neighboring states.”
“Rhode Island right now is in excellent shape.”
Last week I discussed Gordon Fox’s guilty plea for bribery, fraud, and filing a false tax return with students in my introductory sociology class at the men’s medium prison. Their reactions were immediate and articulate: one indignantly remarked that he himself had stolen a great deal less money than the former speaker, and yet was serving a longer prison term. Where, he wanted to know, was the justice in that?
“You might expect stealing from a guy like me,” he said, baring his arms covered with tattoos. But Gordon Fox had an extra responsibility to behave ethically, as an elected representative who specifically undertook to safeguard the common good.
Much data has shown that rule of law applies differently to different groups of people. One need only read the New York Times’ coverage of Ferguson, or Michelle Alexander’s award-winning book, should one need convincing. While this is deplorable everywhere it occurs, my student’s point was straightforward: that those who we elect to care for the collective should be held to a higher standard of behavior, not a lower one.
Rhode Island has been the laughingstock of the country for well over a century for our unwillingness confront political corruption. If there was any doubt as to the need for reinstating the state ethics commission’s authority (famously dismantled in 2009), one might think such doubt would be assuaged by this most recent display of selfishness and disregard for Rhode Islanders, our tax dollars, and our intelligence.
We need more than Governor Raimondo’s milquetoast pro-forma comment that, “the situation is unacceptable” or current Speaker Nicholas Mattiello’s lackluster statement that he is “disappointed.” We need meaningful action from our leadership. Revisiting the ethics commission would be a good start. A real campaign finance bill would also help. We need for everyday Rhode Islanders to do more than wring their hands and go back to work.
More than that though, our leadership must understand—not just claim to understand—that holding public office is a privilege. Like being a parent or a teacher, it means the onus is always on you to be the “good guy.” You are never off the hook.
Former Speaker Fox should be punished to the fullest extent of the law. His behavior is an insult to all of us who work hard to make Rhode Island a good home and a good example.
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More on Gordon Fox’s arrest here.
Gordon Fox is guilty, and I’m not surprised. I’m the guy who ran against the former Rhode Island speaker of the House in 2012. From the first days of our campaign, I pointed to the corruption that seems endemic in Rhode Island’s political structure.
At the time, nobody seemed to believe me. They denied it was happening. They made excuses. They said that it was just the way things are.
Many politicians who are still in office turned out to support Fox. They campaigned for him. They walked with him. They stood in front of the polls on Election Day and told voters to vote for him. They felt at the time that the status quo was better than advocating change.
The media were also complicit. During the campaign, I was faulted again and again for not being a serious politician. I was belittled for keeping my campaign grassroots and not raising a war chest. They dismissed the pay-to-play connections we drew between campaign contributions from the auto body industry and votes cast.
Our very own RI Future said that Fox was “by no means a dark force or a dirty politician. … On the contrary, he’s a good man trying to succeed in an often cutthroat business.” RIPR’s Scott MacKay bluntly opined, “…anyone who believes that Binder can get nearly as much done for the capital city as Fox, arguably the state’s most powerful politician, must believe that elephants can fly.” The pigs started flying when Fox resigned in March of 2013.
And nothing much has changed. Campaigns are still decided, by and large, by who raises the most money. Campaign contributions buy political influence in Rhode Island. Licenses are granted, tax breaks are given and issues are decided when you give contributions to the right politicians.
During the 2012 campaign, Gordon Fox lied. He lied to the press. He lied to the voters. Now he’s admitted his guilt.
He’s confessed to stealing more than $100,000 from his campaign fund, filing fraudulent tax returns, and taking a bribe for a liquor license. If you or I were charged with these offences, we would be facing decades in federal prison. Instead, he’s copped a plea in exchange for three years — one year per charge. It doesn’t seem sufficient.
In Rhode Island, voters have a bad habit of keeping people around who don’t deserve it. We brush away fault and blame, and shrug because “It’s the ways the system works.”
The system still doesn’t work for citizens and taxpayers. Since being anointed as speaker, Nicholas Mattiello has collected more than $100,000 in campaign contributions, even though he ran unopposed in the last election. Do those dollars really buy nothing?
When will this change? How will this change?
The General Assembly could police itself. It could eject members who accept campaign contributions that influence their votes. It could end the practice of late night back room deals. It could enact ethics and campaign finance reform.
We could create a smaller full-time legislature that pays members a living wage so they don’t have to be wealthy or take bribes to survive.
Will they? Probably not.
The next election is in 20 months. We need citizens to start running today for these jobs on the promise of these changes. It’s time to stop voting for the devil we know and instead look for people who are honest and true.
During a televised debate, Gordon Fox accused me of telling tall tales. I didn’t. He was the liar.
Keep that in mind the next time you see an “amateur” taking on a pro.
– Mark Binder, Providence, March 2015
See Fox Lie…
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Former House Speaker Gordon Fox admits he took a bribe and used campaign cash for personal purposes.
In the first transgression, he stole from the citizens of Providence to get rich quick. In the other, he stole from State House special interests because he wasn’t. One of these is a political sin of the highest order. The other is not good, but not nearly as bad.
Selling your vote is among the worst crimes a public official can commit. Fox says he did this in 2008 as a member of the Providence Board of Licensing when he accepted $50,000 in exchange for supporting a liquor license application to a Federal Hill restaurant. In doing so, he stole from the his hometown the right to a fair hearing. He robbed Providence of democracy. Opponents of the liquor license application may well have reason to re-visit the issue, but they are by no means the only victims.
For $50,000, Gordon Fox crushed the notion that everyone has an equal chance in the Ocean State. He cemented the belief that Rhode Island is a pay-to-play state, undoubtedly the single biggest stumbling block to enticing people to live and do commerce here. Anytime a public official places a higher value on their own finances than on democracy society is the victim, and this is especially true with blatant bribery.
Conversely, when Fox spent $108,000 from his campaign accounts on personal expenses, he stole more from politics than from society. Elected officials should never lie, and we’ve got a lot of reasons to doubt Fox’s sincerity, but I’m not as mad at him for this one.
The reason any House speaker has $100,000 in a campaign account to abscond with is because special interests gave it to them hoping it will serve as a quid pro quo for political favor. The line between this legal activity and a bribe is blurry at best, and good government scholars disagree exactly where it falls. Only the explicit request for action separates campaign contributions from bribes. But both diminish democracy, and the idea that we all have an equal shot. Money corrodes democracy, as an illegal bribe and as a perfectly-legal campaign donation.
Other than for his personal use and his own reelection, Fox spent his campaign cash on lavish dinners for legislators, targeting political adversaries and helping political friends. Current Speaker Nick Mattiello does this too. This is why the General Assembly, here and in other states, as well as Congress, generally serve powerful special interests first and the average citizen second. Because the average citizen can only offer their vote and their support, and this commodity is entirely less fungible than cold hard cash on hand.
Don’t believe me? Consider the political insider take on Fox’s transgressions, according to RIPR blogger Scott MacKay: “…in Rhode Island political circles, the biggest rule he broke was the iron, if unofficial, Statehouse cliché: Don’t take a dime while you are serving in the General Assembly. Then cash in for as much as you can make later. By living above his means as a lawmaker (fancy house and late-model Audis in driveway), Fox ruined his chances of getting rich as a lobbyist when his tenure as speaker was over.”
Instead of becoming a wealthy lobbyist, I hope Gordon Fox is able to find redemption by becoming an advocate against the actions he took to build personal wealth and political power. He owes Rhode Island at least that much.
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In the wake of corruption charges against former House Speaker Gordon Fox, Common Cause Rhode Island is calling on the General Assembly to allow the ethics commission to oversee legislators, which currently it does not, and to impose audits on campaign accounts.
“We know there are several simple, immediate actions that can be taken to help hold our public officials more accountable,” Marion said.
Marion noted that in 2003 Fox was fined $10,000 by the state ethics commission for taking on GTech as a lawyer as he was working on a bill to move the business to Providence as a legislator. A 2009 state Supreme Court decision famously exempted legislators from being investigated by the ethics commission, and Common Cause has been advocating to restore their power over legislators ever since.
“When legislators feel there are no repercussions for the smaller stuff, the bigger stuff will eventually take over,” Marion said.
There could be political reasons the House won’t take up the ethics bill this session. Its sponsor is Rep. Mike Marcello, of Smithfield, who challenged Rep. Nick Mattiello as speaker. The Senate version is sponsored by Sen. Ed O’Neill, and independent from North Smithfield, Lincoln. The bill would put the question to the voters of Rhode Island.
Marion also said Fox’s plea today should inspire legislators to require some sort of campaign finance auditing. “Whether random or a percentage, we’ll look at other states and see what they do,” Marion said. “I do know other states routinely look at them.”
]]> Former House Speaker Gordon Fox is facing three years in jail after agreeing to plead guilty to campaign finance fraud and accepting a bribe, state and federal officials announced this morning. The announcement seems the culmination of the investigation into Fox, a powerful Providence Democrat, that was marked by the high-profile raid of his State House office last year.
“When the search warrants in this case were executed nearly a year ago, there was talk about the State House being ‘the People’s House.’ I agree completely. The People’s House should be occupied by elected officials who hold office to serve the people, not themselves,” said US Attorney Peter Neronha in a statement. “As federal and state prosecutors, and federal and state law enforcement officials, we represent the people of the United States and the people of Rhode Island. And we will go anywhere – anywhere – we can lawfully go to obtain the evidence we need to protect their interests.”
Fox, who was said to be the most powerful politician in the state, is accused of using campaign funds for personal expenses. Court documents show he transferred $108,000 from campaign accounts to personal accounts and spent the money at stores such as TJ Maxx, Tiffany’s, Walmart, or on mortgage and car payments.
“Often the balances in Fox’s personal accounts, including his law office account, were insufficient to cover his and his partner’s monthly expenses,” according to court documents. “The amounts that Fox transferred were typically utilized in one week, often days, to pay various bills.”
Court indicate money was transferred from campaign accounts starting in 2008 through 2014.
Fox is also accused of accepting a $50,000 bribe for help obtaining a liquor license in 2008 when he served on the Providence Board of Licenses, an accusation Attorney General Peter Kilmartin said came to light after the raid of Fox’s office.
“During the investigation, when the evidence of the bribery was discovered, the state possessed the prosecutorial tools necessary to move forward with this charge,” Kilmartin said in a press release. “It was that need and the state’s ability to move forward which helped secure a just resolution today.”
According to court documents, Fox will agree not to use as a defense the fact that the alleged bribe is beyond its statute of limitations.
Fox was first elected to office in 1992. In 2010, he was elected speaker of the House. He was the first openly gay house speaker in the country.
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I’ve tried hard not to get into the squabbles of our time, and failed – I’m too juvenile to accept the principles the current conversation is predicated on, yet too foolish to stay out. Another self-deprecating way of saying it would be that I’m too ignorant or lazy to know where to begin, and most importantly, when and how not to. Even when I think I know where to start, it still feels pretty futile.
Well, I think I know where to begin this time. I’d like to show you two quick things:
As Feds trounced into our now-busted Speaker’s office, Justin Katz asked the following on Twitter:
“@NBC10_Parker Silly question, but I can’t help but wonder: Do they knock when they do that, or just stroll right in?”
What Justin was really asking was: “Are the bastards being civil?”
Another one from a year ago: As a bleeding Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was being arrested in a backyard somewhere in Boston, and for dubious reasons wasn’t immediately read his rights, Saul Kaplan had this to say, again on Twitter:
“Read this kid his Miranda rights. We are a nation of laws.”
I’m a decidedly different human being from Justin, Saul, Gordon or Dzhokhar. I walk, like everyone else for that matter, to the hopeful beat of a different drum. My cadence is one that I have a hard time appreciating, but I remain ever thankful I am not a Dzhokhar or for that matter, a Gordon. What is important to note is that we are all citizens – residents with rights and responsibilities to this strange republic. With Tzarnaev the exception, all of the above are also Rhode Islanders who give a damn. Despite the ambient psychosis that comes with being a member of this complicated community, we believe in its core values. We really do. Even when we don’t agree on what exactly they are, why they are, or who embodies those values best, we still share them. We struggle to honor our principles even while we question them – so sometimes, when we’re all in crisis, the scales fall off of our eyes and we can see them clearly in one another.
I’ve been focusing on those values for a while now, to the exclusion of almost anything else that might pay the rent. For me it is all about coping with what this country is, and what it is not. It all came to a head for me, as you might guess, after coming home from Afghanistan. It has taken a few years for me to let go of the crumpled wrapping paper that once conveniently concealed the lunatic shame of it all. It’s been a pissed-off rager of a battle for me ever since, one that has broken me as it has broken many folks who can’t bear to call it even or call it quits. The result is that I am no longer afraid, but instead rather empowered, when I meet anyone who’s touched the dark matter of politics and lived to remark about it. We really need you people!
Those tweets have that special basic substance that makes this struggle worth it. Their depressing context might have us believing that we’re aboard an ill-fated cruise, but their content shows us that we needn’t look for icebergs if we know we already hit one. What we must do instead: make eye contact and start with the basics. We need to agree to take a long look at what we generally take for granted. In a year like this one, we can’t afford not to. We can leave it to history to see who was right or wrong (since no one will ever agree on that anyways!) but we can not leave it to history to honor each other. It is time to dig deep and hit the books together. We have to do it anyways.
We will end up forgotten. Our devotion to the precious basics that we do share, will last.
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He exposed the illegal campaign tactics of the NRA. He leads the Progressive Democrats of Rhode Island. He’s a frequent contributor to this blog. And – hopefully – next Sam Bell will add to his resume state representative from District 4. With news that soon-to-be-former House Speaker Gordon Fox won’t be seeking re-election, Bell has announced he will run for Fox’s old seat.
“Our state needs a fresh Democratic voice on Smith Hill,” said Bell in a widely distributed press release. “As Representative, I’ll fight to invest in our schools and our workforce, and I’ll be an unfailing advocate for transparency and sunlight at the State House.”
Bell has been a frequent critic of conservative Democrats on Smith Hill. Most recently he called attention to the austerity ideas being put forward by Gina Raimondo and as well as by legislative Democrats to pay for the Sakonnet River Bridge. But he is best known for exposing the NRA’s “illicit” political action committee activity. Bell learned their practice was illegal and the NRA paid a $63,000 fine, which he says is the second largest campaign fine in state history.
“I’m glad to have stood up for the people of Rhode Island against the powerful, out-of-state gun lobby,” he said in his statement. “I’ll continue to protect my constituents against the forces of special interests on Smith Hill.
And Bell will likely be the only RI Future contributor vying for the District 4 seat at the State House. Mark Binder, who challenged Fox in 2012 and occasionally posts to RI Future, indicated he will NOT run again in an email to supporters today.
“Let me be blunt,” he wrote. “Any representative who votes for the sort of “Leadership” that enabled Gordon Fox to abuse his power is betraying the interests of citizens. We, the people of Rhode Island did not elect you to submit to the whims of lobbyists and special interests and corporations. We elected you to serve the people.
“For too long the political conversation has been framed by special interests. The purpose of our State Government is not to create jobs, however much that may be a method for getting votes. The purpose of our State Government is to create an environment where people can live and work and thrive. This means protecting our landscape and natural resources, paying for education that teaches beyond tests, and offering powerful reasons for people to live and work here.”
Ed. note: An earlier version of this post incorrectly said Binder would run due. He is not.
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Whoever the next House Speaker is, their chief of staff won’t be Frank Anzeveno. The top aid to the past three speakers said in a statement that he cleared out his State House desk and won’t serve the next speaker.
As is his custom, he wouldn’t speak on the record. But House spokesman Larry Berman released this statement on his behalf:
“Privately, I have known for a while that Gordon Fox would not be running for another term. He did not want to announce that decision so that the focus would be on the many challenging issues before the House of Representatives. With this knowledge and consultation with my family, I made the decision to leave at the end of this session in June. I had previously been in contact with the Employees’ Retirement System of Rhode Island and the Joint Committee on Legislative Services to make an informed decision.
“In light of recent events at the Statehouse, time has accelerated. I cleaned out my office over the weekend in anticipation that a new Speaker needs to bring in his own staff.
“It has been an honor for me to have witnessed the hard work, dedication and commitment that our public officials, as well as the loyal and conscientious staff, bring to the Statehouse every day. I will always respect the House of Representatives and wish them the best in tackling the difficult issues before them.”
Anzeveno began his State House career in 1980 as an elected representative from North Providence. Her served for 18 years and in 2001, he became Speaker John Harwood’s chief of staff, a position he retained through Bill Murphy and Gordon Fox’s tenure.
Privately, state reps said bills required his blessing, and he relished in his bad cop reputation at the State House. He had a sign on his desk – and I would love to know what happens to it now – that read, “No better friend, no worse enemy.”
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